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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25569865">soft lemur, warm lemur, little ball of fur</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caelum_Blue/pseuds/Caelum_Blue'>Caelum_Blue</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Kataang Week 2020 [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Avatar: The Last Airbender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Air Nomads (Avatar), Animals, Book 1: Water (Avatar), Episode: s01e03 The Southern Air Temple, Fluff, Found Family, Friendship, Gen, Kataang Week 2020</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 02:21:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,001</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25569865</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caelum_Blue/pseuds/Caelum_Blue</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for Kataang Week 2020. Prompt - Soft.</p><p>Momo is figuring out where he fits in with his new family.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aang &amp; Katara &amp; Momo (Avatar), Aang &amp; Katara (Avatar), Aang &amp; Momo (Avatar), Katara &amp; Momo (Avatar)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Kataang Week 2020 [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1851361</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>95</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>soft lemur, warm lemur, little ball of fur</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Idk, this one's just cute. I kept the relationship tag as &amp; because it's early in Book 1 and there's no romantic stuff going on. *shrugs*</p><p>Enjoy!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Momo was skittish the first few days he was with them. He scampered around Appa’s saddle and flew loop-de-loops around the bison while they traveled and stuck his hands into every bundle of supplies they had, and every evening when they stopped for the night he’d spend an hour running circles around their campsite. He chittered a lot and screamed occasionally and spent a lot of time watching Katara and Sokka from a safe distance. </p><p>Aang was the only person Momo came within arm’s reach of, and that was probably because Aang kept fruit in his pockets. When Momo progressed to diving into Aang’s clothes in search of food, Katara finally voiced her concerns. </p><p>“Aang, are you sure he’s...tame?” She’d grown up on the tundra, where most animals were either eaten or wanted to eat <em> you. </em> Watching Momo clamber all over Aang with prying hands and nibbling teeth was putting her on edge.</p><p>Aang watched in delight as Momo tried to shove his head up his sleeve, searching for treats. “I mean, he’s <em> not </em> tame, but...he’s also not exactly <em> wild</em>-wild.” Momo gave up on Aang’s sleeve and hopped up on Aang’s shoulder to nose at his shirt collar. “His ancestors were domesticated, so it shouldn’t be too hard to tame him.” Momo found a berry Aang had hidden and snatched it from his collar, chittering happily. He took a moment to nuzzle Aang’s chin before eating it. Aang grinned. “Lemurs are pretty intelligent. They kind of domesticated themselves, actually.”</p><p>“How so?”</p><p>“We leave food out, at the altars,” Aang said. “Always have, ever since the temples were first built.” He paused a moment, expression faltering slightly. Probably realizing he’d been speaking in present tense. Katara didn’t comment on it. Aang soldiered on. “So at some point thousands of years ago, the wild lemurs figured out the food was free for the taking, so they started eating it, and we figured out how to live with each other. And then we started keeping them on purpose and bred them for less wild traits. Momo might never have seen humans before, but his recent ancestors still had all those traits.”</p><p>“So...Momo’s not really wild, he’s just feral?” Katara surmised.</p><p>Aang grinned. “That’s it!”</p><p>Katara had to suppress a grimace. Feral wasn’t much better.</p><p>“And lemurs are really social creatures,” Aang added. “Momo must’ve had a troop at some point, but he’s obviously been alone for a while and he’s made it clear he wants to join our family. He’s just trying to figure out how he fits in, what he can and can’t do. We just need to give him some time to settle in...and also train him to have the right behaviors.”</p><p>“Is that why you’ve been putting fruit in your clothes?” Katara asked, watching Momo curiously pat Aang’s stomach.</p><p>“Yep!”</p><p>“...What kind of behavior are you even trying to get from that?”</p><p>It was at that moment that Momo decided to dive down Aang’s collar into his shirt. Aang giggled for a moment, while Katara winced at the idea of the lemur’s little teeth being so close to her friend’s skin. And then Momo came back out, a marble clutched in one little paw. He stared at it confusedly.</p><p>“Momo,” Aang said, and the lemur looked up - he was already growing used to his name. “Marbles please.” And then he switched the marble in Momo’s paw out with a berry. The lemur chittered, pleased, and stuffed the food in his mouth. Aang grinned. “Good boy!”</p><p>“You’re...training him to get things out of your pockets,” Katara said.</p><p>“Yep! Lemurs are great at getting stuff! That’s why we have them, you know - to fetch things.”</p><p>“Really?”</p><p>“Sometimes,” Aang said, with an air of experience, “you’ve got a whole herd of bison that you’re trying to keep on track, and one of the calves gets frisky, and you don’t have time to dive after your glider when it falls off the saddle. Or your kids are being rambunctious in the back while you’re trying to navigate and their favorite doll gets thrown overboard. Or you hit some turbulence and the map you were holding goes flying. Lemurs are <em> great </em> at diving after things!”</p><p>“Huh,” said Katara. She could see how that might be useful.</p><p>Momo had finished chewing on his berry, and he ran his hands over Aang’s bald head. Aang giggled.</p><p>“Now what’s he doing?” Katara asked.</p><p>“Trying to groom me, I think. Lemurs groom each other to show affection. I don’t have any hair, but they’d groom some of the older monks’ beards. And the <em> girls </em> had hair, they always loved grooming the girls…” Aang trailed off just as Momo lifted his head to look at Katara.</p><p>Katara blinked back.</p><p>Momo made a trilling little noise and hopped from Aang’s shoulder to Katara’s.</p><p>“Whoa - ”</p><p>“Hold still!” Aang said, delighted. “He won’t hurt you! Just let him do his thing.”</p><p>Katara felt little lemur hands pat over her hair and ear and the bun at the back of her head. “Eep,” she managed.</p><p>“He likes you!” Aang grinned.</p><p>It wasn’t so bad, Katara thought, holding perfectly still as Momo gently...what, petted her? It was <em> weird, </em> but it wasn’t awful.</p><p>Momo took another minute to paw through her hair before hopping from her shoulder down to her lap. He turned and looked up at Katara for a moment, and she stared right back at those big green eyes. Then, coming to some sort of decision, Momo turned and curled up in her lap, perfectly at ease, and he made an expectant chittering noise.</p><p>“You’d better repay the favor,” Aang told her.</p><p>Carefully, Katara ran a hand over one of Momo’s long ears. “Oh,” she breathed, as her fingers stroked fur softer than sealskin. “He’s <em> soft.” </em></p><p>“Lemurs are super soft,” Aang agreed.</p><p>Katara eagerly sank both hands into soft lemur fur, and Momo was a happy purring puddle of trust in her lap less than five seconds later.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Thanks for reading! Kudos and comments are always appreciated, especially since I'm pretty sure I'm about to start A Day at work and I could use the positivity. &lt;3</p><p>Notes!</p><p>Headcanon that flying lemurs, much like cats, domesticated themselves and humans went along with it. Also monkeys hanging out around temples where a lot of food offerings get left is indeed a thing that happens in the real world, so obviously lemurs would do that too.</p><p>I am pretty sure that the driving force behind the domestication of flying lemurs was, as Aang said, they're good at fetching things. Momo grabs <i>so much stuff</i> for the Gaang throughout the series - off the top of my head, marbles, spearheads Sokka had chopped off, a fish, the waterbending scroll, all that random junk when Sokka and Katara got sick (no one had trained him how to fetch water yet it wasn't his fault he didn't understand and he was trying!). Having an animal that can act as a companion and an extra set of hands sounds very useful when you're up in the sky all day.</p><p>Thanks for reading!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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